19. Evgeny
Evgeny
My heart eventually slows to a normal rhythm when I see Harper pull into the garage from the feed on my phone.
What I told her this morning is true, I’d be an idiot to not have her followed, but the truth is I didn’t.
She’s been free this whole time, free to run and tell the world what I did to her and free to write the tell-all piece that would destroy my life, but she didn’t. She came back.
I might not have assigned anyone to her, but I did track her phone, so I know she had a bit of fun while she was out.
It was stupid to let her go without a guard, but I’d needed to know what she’d do.
The fact that she didn’t run and spill all my secrets is promising, but it’s not enough to get my hopes up.
If she’d talked now, she’d lose out on inside info about my cousin.
There’s no way to know what made her decide to keep her mouth shut on this one, and I’m sure as hell not going to ask her and force her to lie to my face.
Sometimes it’s better to not know the truth.
Relieved that she’s at least back home, no matter the reason why, I put my phone away and instead focus on what Caleb is saying.
Unfortunately, it’s nothing good. Discovery isn’t giving us anything we can work with, and Charlie is still coming up empty-handed.
If I was doomed to always follow the law, Sasha would be fucked, left to rot in jail for months and then possibly another year while this thing drags out in court.
Lucky for the both of us that we have Niki and a family full of men who don’t mind bending the rules to get what we want.
“Fine,” I tell Caleb. “Thanks for the update. Let me know when the next batch comes in so we can go through it together.”
“Sorry, Ev,” he says. “I know you really wanted something before your meeting with the judge.”
“We’ve still got a day,” I tell him. “Maybe we’ll get our miracle.”
“Since when did you become such an optimist?”
“It’s something new I’m trying,” I say. “Figured it couldn’t hurt.”
“Gertie will be thrilled that she’s finally rubbing off on you,” he says, making me grin. “Have you noticed the music she’s been playing this last week?”
“The stuff that makes me feel like I’m at a yoga retreat in India?” I ask.
“She told me it’s chakra healing music. She said you’re way out of alignment and she’s trying to fix you up.”
“Let me guess, her new guy is into all this?”
Caleb laughs when he says, “She said his name is Sage, and he lives in a yurt and likes to practice naked yoga with the sunrise.”
“Jesus,” I groan. “If I ever meet him, that’s all I’m going to be able to picture.”
“I saw a picture of him,” Caleb says, and before I can tell him to stop talking, he adds, “He has very hairy shoulders and a sizable set of moobs.”
“Moobs?” I ask.
“You know, man boobs.” He uses his hands to emphasize their size like most men do when talking about a woman, and I groan at the very vivid image he’s put in my head. “Can you imagine him naked and sweaty and getting into all those poses?”
“No, and I don’t want to,” I tell him. “I may never forgive you for sharing those details with me.”
“If I have to have them in my head, it’s only fair you do too.”
“I’m not so sure about that. I think that might fall under perks of being the boss.”
He shrugs and says, “Well, either way we’re both in hell now.”
While he stands to go back to his office, I start going through my emails and doing my best to forget everything I just heard.
To counter the image, I think about this morning instead, the way Harper had looked when I’d had my head buried between her thighs, eating her like the delicious temptation she is.
Fuck, I swear I can still taste her on my tongue and smell the erotic scent of her arousal.
Shaking my head, I force this new set of images away for very different reasons. I need to focus and get some more work done, and it’s hard to get my head where it needs to be when the other more obnoxious one is throbbing in my pants and growing harder by the second.
With the clock counting down to my conference with Judge Mathis and ADA Lang, I go through everything we have about Rosalie and DeMarco, trying to piece it all together and make the puzzle fit.
After spending too long at the office, I come back to a house that feels like home because Harper is in it.
We share a supper while I give her what I can for her newest article and then listen while she tells me about her meeting with Arthur.
She gets a shy look on her face when she grabs a bag and sets it down in front of me.
“What’s this?”
“It’s nothing,” she starts to say, ducking her head and then pretending to be absorbed with stacking our empty dishes in the sink. “Just something I saw today that I thought you might like.”
I reach in the bag and pull out the three books that are nestled inside. Reading the titles, I flip through them, touched that she thought of me while she was at the bookstore. They’re all three horror novels, all of them ones that I’ve been wanting to read but haven’t had the time to buy.
“Thank you, Harper,” I say, setting the books down and watching the blush start to creep up her cheeks. “That was very nice of you.”
“It was nothing,” she says.
“Well, it was something to me.” When she looks up, I give her a wink. “Did that extraordinary breakfast I had this morning have anything to do with this thoughtful gift?”
Her blush deepens at the memory of the way I’d devoured her with my mouth, and the sight of it does things to me, things only she can make me feel. When she starts to walk towards me, I wait until she’s close enough to grab before pulling her into my lap.
Later, when I’m lying in bed and her naked body is partially draped over mine, I brace the book she bought me against her thigh and try to focus on the words, but my mind is too wrapped up in her to concentrate on anything else.
I’m dangerously close to convincing myself we could both learn to be happy if I buy a fluffy pair of cuffs and chain her to my bed.
I’m confident Watson would be on board. I’m not so sure his beautiful owner wouldn’t end up hating me for it, though, even if he was more than happy to take all his future naps on my couch and watch Scooby-Doo on my giant TV.
I want my cousin’s freedom. Sasha rotting in jail or, worse, prison is not an option I’m even willing to consider.
His freedom is tied to Harper’s, but even knowing that, I won’t stop doing everything I can to free him.
Giving up on the book, I take off my glasses and set them both aside.
I watch Harper sleep until my own eyes close and I fall into a light sleep that does very little to actually make me feel rested.
A text from Niki wakes me up before I’m ready, and when I see that he wants to meet, I carefully move Harper off me so I can take a quick shower.
Before I leave, I kiss her bare shoulder, leave her a quick note, and then pet Watson’s head.
It might not be walking out the door with her arousal still on my lips, but it’s just as satisfying in other ways to see her curled up in my bed with my scent all over her skin.
I meet Niki at the address he gave me, immediately recognizing it as the newest warehouse the Bratva purchased for things they try very hard to keep me from knowing about.
Pulling around back, I park next to his motorcycle, cut the engine, and then walk towards the back door that’s partially propped open with a cinder block.
I’d be worried about the security if I didn’t know for a fact he already has the place rigged with cameras and probably clocked my arrival the second I pulled into the parking lot.
Opening the door, I step through and then kick the block aside so the door will shut. The place is lit up, the large space bare except for a folding table that my cousin is standing next to while he looks at his laptop.
Without looking up, he says, “Agent Jackson got back to me. I wanted to tell you first. I need to know if this is enough to get all charges dropped before I start telling the others. I don’t want to get Uncle Lev’s hopes up for no reason.”
I come to stand next to him, my focus quickly falling to the screen in front of me when Niki pulls up CCTV footage and hits play. Grabbing my reading glasses, I put them on and lean closer. The image is grainy, and I want to be able to see as much detail as possible.
“This is the night Rosalie was murdered,” Niki says when a man walks into view.
I recognize him instantly. Sasha has a very distinct Fuck everyone kind of walk.
He knows he’s the scariest thing on the streets, and his body language shows it.
Any criminal with half a brain cell would take one look at him and quickly decide to pick another target.
We both watch as Sasha walks to the apartment building, takes the flight of stairs connected to the cement wall to the third floor, and then stops at the third door on the right.
Rosalie’s door. He knocks, and several seconds later, the door is opened.
It’s hard to see her clearly, but then she steps out to look both ways, giving us a perfect view of her before she waves him inside.
The door closes behind them as I look over at Niki.
“What the fuck, man? This is the kind of evidence we need to bury. The jury is going to take one look at that and feel completely justified in sentencing Sasha to a life in prison. Please tell me there’s more to this.”
“Just keep watching,” he says, the carefree tone making me feel a little bit better about what we’re seeing. Surely he didn’t bring me down here just to show me a video that makes our cousin look guilty as hell.